“It’s a Ponderosa pine,” he’d said with a smile. “Don’t usually get them up this high, despite the namesake.”
The forest was magic, then. Ethereal. A never-ending vastness I couldn’t comprehend beyondinfinity,filled with trees and birds and bears and mountain lions.As a child, it’d been exciting.
Now, I saw it for what it really was.
Stark and harsh, the landscape still took my breath away, but in the way a siren song lured an unsuspecting sailor. The forest would swallow me whole if I weren’t careful, caught staring for too long, and not watching my step.
Beautiful and dangerous.
Maybe I would let it, one of these days.
An incoming call rang through the truck speakers, briefly pulling my attention away from ensuring I wouldn’t steer off the side of the mountain road intoNowhere.
That wouldnotbe the way to go out.
I checked the caller ID and answered. “Hey, Mom. I’m just coming into Ponderosa now.”
“Oh, good. How was the drive?” she asked. A water faucet shut off in the background, followed by pots and pans banging around like she’d called mid-dinner preparation.
“Uneventful for the most part. I’ll be at Dad’s in ten minutes or so. I think we’re meeting Leonard and Bobby for a bite tonight, so I can grab the keys to the lookout.”
“Are you driving out tomorrow?”
I flicked on my blinker and turned off the paved highway just before coming into town. The deep ruts in the dirt road jostled me as I slowly wound down the steep drive. “Day after. I need to finish supplying up in town tomorrow. I’ll head out Sunday morning.”
She sighed. “Well, just be careful. Keep your phone with you all the time when you’re out there, you know I worry. Call me if you need anything at all, that’s all I ask.”
I knew what she wasn’t saying.
I wasn’tbeforeReece anymore, so I had to be extra careful. I wasn’t the man who’d practically grown up in a fire lookout.
When I wasn’t visiting Mom in Tennessee, I’d spend at least a few weeks every summer with Dad when he’d fill in as a lookout for the U.S. Forest Service. I could operate an OsborneFirefinder in my sleep and knew how to mentally manage the extended periods of isolation.
That was the whole reason I’d agreed to take the job this season. The thought of leaving everything behind and disappearing into the forest for a few months was music to my ears.
“I’ll be fine, Mom, please don’t—SHIT!” I yelled, slamming on the brakes. My tires skidded, sliding on loose gravel and dirt until the truck lurched to a halt.
A large tree limb lay across the road and blocked my path. It was hidden around a bend, my view of the road obscured by the thick brush growing on either side until I was nearly on top of it.
“Reece! Oh my God, are you alright? Reece? Reece!” Mom yelled, voice pitched high.
“I’m alright!” I answered, probably louder than I needed to. “It’s just a fallen branch in the road, that’s all. Nothing to freak out about.”
Great. Another worry for her to suffocate me with.
Heart still pounding, I unplugged the phone, cradled it to my ear, and stepped out to move the obstruction aside.
“Are you sure you should be out there all by yourself?” Mom asked, just like I knew she would.
I rolled my eyes and gripped the snapped-off end of the branch to drag it back into the encroaching tree line. “I’ll befine,” I repeated with a huff. “The scariest thing at a fire lookout is the lack of indoor plumbing. As long as there’s enough toilet paper, I’ll be set.”
She wasn’t assuaged by my sparkling sense of humor.
“What if you have another flare-up? Or something else goes wrong? It could take hours for someone to get to you. I’m just not sure you’re ready—what?”She hollered the last part away from the phone, her voice echoing like she spoke to someone across the house.
“Oh!”She continued, talking to me again. “Keith wants to say hello. Hold on, let me put you on speaker.”
I took advantage of the brief pause and heaved the other end of the branch to the side of the road. Dad would probably have to deal with it later, or else it’d roll and block the drive again, but I’d at least get through for now.
